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Also affiliate look at network ranking, EPC and conversion. You could have a 5% commission versus another program with a 10% commission but if your conversion is 5% and theirs is 1% it makes a difference.

Agree with the above except the EPC, it's a useless metric and varies greatly from affiliate to affiliate in each program (e.g. ours vary from $3 up to $700+ per individual affiliate but average may say $30+)

After finding the merchants who carry the products you are interested in (using search) first and foremost, I'd recommend looking at merchants commission and conversion rates, then their reversal rate. Say if their conversion and commission rates are great but they decline 50% of commissions that effectively reduces the commission rate by half.

My top PPC affiliates use EPC to set their ad bids so its critical to them. Price comparison affiliates have told me that conversion and EPC are how they rank merchants on their pages. I struggled with a great merchant who had 1/4 the EPC of competitors and couldn't get their products listed all things being equal.

There seems to be a number of AM/OPMs who hide behind the "No EPC" philosophy and I am not one of them. Within the same network EPC is a comparison of merchants in the same category that affiliates use compare programs especially since conversion is seldom listed as a metric by many networks. Its also a crucial tool for indicating how an affiliate is doing in a program versus other affiliates in that program. When I see an affiliate with high clicks but low EPC I reach out to see how we can better target their visitors.

Matt, different affiliates have different needs. It couldn't hurt to have a datafeed, but if you do, keep it updated or those who need the datafeed will notice and not promote you. There are couponers who want coupons. If you have coupons, keep them updated too. Everyone likes a higher commission, but the higher your commission won't that hurt your coupons since they come from the same pot of money? The audience fit is the audience fit and nothing you can do about that (except list it if your audience isn't obvious.)

To make a successful website requires constant improvement and running a successful affiliate program does too. Keep improving and trying different things and see WHAT WORKS FOR YOU.